For Season 2, Sam Esmail takes the directorial reins for all 12 episodes of his USA hit “Mr. Robot.” He tells us why—plus how he cast Rami Malek, welcomed new actors, and kept plenty of intrigue after last season’s big reveals.

Isaacs returns to American TV with USA’s 10-part series “Dig,” and he talks to Backstage about adopting and discarding dialects and trying to balance his family life without strangling himself with boring work.